A Wife in Time (Silhouette Desire) (16 page)

“Nut?”

“Maniac, weirdo. Come on, let’s go.”

Kane set almost a jogging pace back to the boardinghouse, only to find that Susannah was gone.

“Gone? What do you mean, gone?” Kane demanded of a startled Mrs. B. “Where did she go?”

“She didn’t tell me. I wanted her to take Mikey with her. The professor offered to accompany her, but she refused both offers. She left shortly after supper. As soon as she got that note, in fact.”

Kane pounced on that bit of information. “What note?”

“The one that came for her.”

“Who sent it?”

“I’m sure I don’t know.”

“I do,” Mikey piped up from his seat on the top step of the stairway.

“What are you doing out of bed at this time of night?” Mrs. B. chastised him.

“What makes you think you know where Mrs. Wilder went, Mikey?” Oliver asked the young boy.

“‘Cause I saw the note, that’s why.”

“I didn’t know you could read,” Mrs. B. said in amazement.

“I’ve been teaching him,” Oliver said.

“And your name is?” Mrs. B. inquired.

“Oliver Ogilvie at your service, ma’am.”

“Can we get the pleasantries over with later,” Kane said impatiently. “Where did she go?” he demanded of Mikey.

“To the bridge.”

“What bridge?”

“I couldn’t read the name in the note.”

“How many bridges are there in Savannah?” Kane turned to ask Oliver. “More than one?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Great.”

“I reckon it would help if I showed you the note, then?” Mikey said.

Kane grabbed it out of the boy’s hand before gripping his shoulder in a sign of appreciation. “Thanks, kid. You done good.”

“Thanks.” Mikey beamed. “Then I can come rescue her with you?”

There was a moment of silence as Kane hurriedly read the note, which had supposedly been sent on his behalf and listed the time and place to meet him. “No, you can’t come with us,” Kane finally replied. Seeing the youngster’s crestfallen expression, he added, “Oliver and I need you to stay here and protect Mrs. B. and to wait to see if Susannah should come back here.”

“Oh, my!” Mrs. B. exclaimed. “You don’t think we’re in any danger, do you? Could it be those ruffians who stole your luggage when you first came to town, do you think?”

Kane’s expression darkened. “I have a suspicion of who wrote this note, and I don’t aim on letting him get away with it.”

“We’ll hail a cab immediately,” Oliver said, putting on his hat and bowing to Mrs. B. “I hope we can meet again under more auspicious circumstances. Good evening, ma’am.”

* * *

Kane was already outside—on the corner, sticking two fingers into his mouth for a piercing whistle that always worked whenever he was in Manhattan. Hopefully it would work to get a carriage here, too.

When Kane felt a hand on his shoulder, he thought it was Oliver joining him. Instead it was one of the men he’d played poker with that first night—J. P. Bellows. “I’ll take that watch from you now,” J.P. said.

“What are you talking about?”

“Ah, putting up a fight, are you? I thought you might. So I brought along a little muscle to convince you.”

The man looked seven feet tall and about as wide.

“What’s going on here?” Oliver demanded as he finally joined Kane.

“Let’s get him,” J.P. ordered.

Kane couldn’t believe this was happening. His anger at Gordon Stevens spilled over to include J.P. and his henchman. They were in his way. Waiting until the last minute to step out of the hulk’s way, Kane reached for the man’s neck. A second later, his foe lay in a crumpled heap on the sidewalk.

Meanwhile, Oliver was in the midst of an old-fashioned fisticuffs with J.P. A firm upper right to the chin and the other man joined his hired hand on the ground just as a carriage finally pulled up.

“You go on ahead,” Oliver told Kane. “I’ll wait for the authorities to come and deal with these miscreants. I’ll catch up with you at the bridge. Go, before it’s too late!”

* * *

Susannah approached the deserted bridge with some trepidation. She wasn’t real fond of heights. The last time she’d been on a bridge had been when a couple of friends of hers wanted her to videotape them bungee-jumping off one. She’d aimed the camera down and looked the other way.

She heard a noise ahead of her. Squinting into the heavy mist she said, “Kane, is that you?”

A man materialized a mere foot in front of her. The man wasn’t Kane. It was Gordon Stevens. “Your husband won’t be meeting you here after all, Mrs. Wilder,” the law clerk said. “You won’t be seeing him...or anyone else.”

“I
won’t be seeing anyone?” Susannah repeated in confusion. “You mean because this fog is so thick?”

“No, I mean you won’t be seeing anyone because you’ve been inquiring into matters that are none of your concern.”

Her heart sank and the hair at the back of her neck went funny, the way it did whenever she faced danger. “What matters might you be referring to?”

“Don’t play me for a fool. That’s what
she
did.”

“Who?”

“Elsbeth. But you know that already. You knew that I had to push her down those stairs.”

“You!”

“She laughed at me, you see. I loved her and she laughed at me. So you can understand why I had to do what I did.”

Susannah hurriedly assured him, “Oh, I understand.” What she understood was that she had to get out of there, but fast! Gordon Stevens was a man who’d clearly gone over the edge.

She shifted away from him, but he shot his hand out and fastened it around her arm in a painful grip.

“You weren’t thinking of going somewhere, were you, Mrs. Wilder?” he asked in the cordial voice of a man inquiring after a neighbor’s health. “Because I couldn’t allow that. You know too much.”

“No, I don’t. I didn’t know it was you....”

“No? That’s a pity. Because you know
now
and that makes you a dangerous liability.” Tugging on her arm, he began drawing her closer to the bridge’s railing.

“At least tell me why you did it,” Susannah said, trying to stall for more time as she used her free hand to reach into her purse, hoping to find something to hit him or distract him with. “You claimed you loved Elsbeth. How could you love someone and then murder them?”

“She didn’t love me back. She
wouldn’t
love me back.”

“So you killed her?” Her fingers closed around her keys. She remembered a self-defense course she’d taken at the local Y that advised using keys to strike at an attacker’s eyes. But first she had to get the keys out of her purse without him seeing her.

“That’s right. If I couldn’t have her, then no one could.”

They were almost at the bridge’s railing. “What are you going to do now?” she demanded, the fear in her voice very real.

“What do you think, Mrs. Wilder? If that is your real name.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that Mr. Whitaker had me telegraph your supposed dear friend Althea Hall of New York City. She telegraphed back this morning that she’d never heard of either Kane or Susannah Wilder. We also telegraphed the jeweler, the one you claimed supposedly made that necklace for you.” Gordon reached out to flick the necklace insultingly. “And he also denied ever hearing of either of you. I would remind you, Mrs. Whoever-you-are, that you don’t have much time left on this earth. So you had better tell me now—who are you?”

“A friend of Elsbeth’s.” Susannah sensed her presence around her in the thickly swirling fog. “She brought me here to solve her murder.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m not a friend of Althea Hall’s. I’m her great-granddaughter.”

“That’s impossible!”

“Not with the help of a ghost. Elsbeth’s ghost. She’s here now.”

Startled, Gordon loosened his grip momentarily. Seizing her chance, Susannah grabbed her keys, inadvertently yanking on the personal alarm as she did so. Its shrill sound pierced the night.

Kane heard the noise and recognized it for what it was—a device from his own time. “Susannah!” he shouted into the thick mist. “Where are you?”

The fog displaced the noise, muffling it and giving him false readings.

He shouted her name again.

“Here! Kane, I’m here! Help me!”

Susannah’s struggle with Gordon was hindered by the fact that he’d heard her alarm go off. At first, he’d stepped away from her to cover his ears. Freed of his hold, Susannah had turned to run, only to trip over the hem of her red velvet dress.

Gordon’s hold on her arm had prevented her from falling flat on her face, but now his grip was tighter than ever as he dragged her toward the railing once again, stepping on the wailing alarm in the process. When that didn’t stop it, he kicked it over the edge of the bridge. The noise abruptly stopped as the alarm hit the water below. He swiftly grabbed her purse and heaved it into the river. “You’re next,” he said.

“Kane!” Susannah shrieked, as she dug in her heels.

And then Kane was there. Coming out of the white fog like a legendary hero of old, his shout of fury was like an ancient Viking battle cry. He aimed straight for Gordon, hitting him in the back, just at the kidneys, with his shoulder.

For one perilous second, Susannah teetered on the edge of the railing. She felt herself falling, her horrified gaze staring into the murky darkness below, before a hand grabbed her and yanked her back to safety.

It was Kane. She clutched his shoulders as he briefly hugged her. Looking over her shoulder, she cried out a warning. “Look out, Kane, he’s got a knife!”

Shoving her aside, Kane pivoted, turning on his heel and ducking as Gordon slashed air instead of muscle.

“What’s the matter, Gordo?” Kane taunted, his hands held out in a universal come-get-me gesture. “Feeling the heat, are you? Starting to panic a little?”

Gordon lashed out again, this time coming closer than Kane felt real comfortable with. Damn it, where was Oliver?

“So why’d you do it, Gordo? Why did you shove Elsbeth down those stairs?”

“I already told you.”

“Not me. You didn’t tell me. Must have been someone else. You’re getting confused, Gordo. Does that happen to you a lot, lately? I’ll bet it does. Because you’re definitely a few cards short of a full deck, aren’t you, Gordo?”

“Stop calling me that!” Gordon yelled, his face turning red. He struck out with the knife again, this time missing Kane by a goodly distance.

“Your stress is showing, Gordo. Maybe they’ll go easy on you. After all, you’re not sane. Is that why you did it?”

“I killed Elsbeth because I loved her,” Gordon shouted. “And I’m not going to jail for it!”

“Did you hear that, Oliver?” Kane yelled out into the fog, praying the detective had arrived by now. Susannah stood in the background; he could see her shivering.

“I’m not falling for that old trick,” Gordon scoffed.

“I heard it,” Oliver confirmed from the mist. “You’d do best to turn yourself in, Mr. Stevens,” the detective called out, his voice getting nearer by the second. “The authorities will look on you more favorably if you do. You know the law, Mr. Stevens.”

Turning his attention back to Susannah, Gordon shouted, “This is all your fault. It’s because of you that I’m in all this trouble!”

Quick as a flash, he ran toward her, his knife raised.

Kane managed to knock the knife from the law clerk’s hand but couldn’t stop the other man from grabbing Susannah.

“Let her go,” Kane gritted.

The gleam in Gordon Stevens’s eyes was fiendish as he yelled in a shrill voice, “I’m not going to prison!”

“You don’t have much choice in the matter,” Oliver said as he joined Kane.

Kane’s heart was in his throat. He couldn’t rush Gordon now; the man was perched on top of the railing, and he had a tight grip on Susannah’s arm. If Gordon fell or jumped, he’d take Susannah with him. She’d already almost ended up in the river once, tonight.

“I have a choice,” Gordon shouted at them. “And I’m taking it. I’m not going to jail. I’d rather end my life in the river.”

“Fine by me,” Kane said, his voice deadly. “But you’re not taking Susannah with you.”

“You can’t stop me.” Squinting into the mist, Gordon suddenly gasped. “Elsbeth!”

Kane saw his chance and he took it. Leaping forward, he took hold of Susannah’s other arm, yanking her from Gordon’s grasp just as the law clerk slipped and toppled into the Savannah River.

* * *

“It’ll be all right,” Kane whispered soothingly as he rocked Susannah in his arms.

“He was going to kill me,” Susannah said, her voice shaking almost as much as she was.

Echoes of the violence and fear she’d just lived through continued to reverberate through her, as her mind flashed by an instant replay of all that had just occurred.

In the distance she was vaguely aware of Oliver talking to uniformed officers. The police. But she preferred to keep her attention focused on Kane, the warmth of his lips brushing her temple as he murmured reassurances to her, the tender way he held her in his arms, the gentleness of his hands.

When she finally did lift her head from his shoulder the first thing she noticed was that the thick mist was lifting with a mysterious and unnatural suddenness, leaving her wondering if the thick pea-souper had been a natural phenomenon or a bit of ghostly magic devised by Elsbeth.

“The fog is clearing up,” she said.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked yet again.

She nodded. “He threw my purse over the bridge,” she said.

“I know. It will be okay,” he murmured soothingly, running his hand over her cheek.

“No, it won’t. What if that purse shows up again and they find my credit cards and everything else in there? I could mess up history.”

“I doubt that.”

“Okay, then how do I explain the loss to the credit-card company? Tell the customer-service rep that some Victorian maniac disposed of my purse and its contents into the Savannah River a hundred and eleven years ago? That will go over big, I’m sure!”

Seeing Oliver approaching them, Kane made no reply, but did gently squeeze her shoulder in warning.

“Good news. First off, may I say that I’m greatly relieved that you are all right, Mrs. Wilder,” Oliver said.

“I think that after what we’ve been through you may call me Susannah now,” she replied.

“Yes, well, one of the police officers found your bag. It was dangling from one of the bridge’s support beams below and we managed to retrieve it for you.”

“Thank heavens!” She snatched it from him and hugged it to her bosom. Looking down at the dirty smudge the bag made on her velvet dress, she sighed. “This dress is never going to recover.”

“I’ve arranged for a carriage to take you back to your boardinghouse,” Oliver said. “I’ll just tell the police you’re leaving.”

Once he was gone, Susannah took a few steps away from Kane, only to almost trip over something. “What?” Looking down, she saw the gleam of her keys. She quickly bent down to pick them up. The alarm must have come loose from the key chain when Gordon stepped on it and in the scuffle the keys had been kicked aside. She gripped them in her hand, the metal biting into her palm.

Kane gently undid her clenched fist, took the keys and put them in her purse for her. Zipping the bag closed, he put an arm around her. “Come on. You’ve got your bag and your keys and most important, you’ve got your life. I’ll take you back to the boardinghouse now.”

“No.” Susannah lifted her head as if listening for something...or someone. “No, we have to go to the Whitaker house.”

“At this time of night?” Oliver said, having just rejoined them. “Whatever for? I can assure you that Mr. Whitaker knew nothing of his law clerk’s activities either here this evening or the night that Elsbeth Whitaker was killed.”

“Did you ever find out who Whitaker was meeting in the cemetery that night?”

Oliver nodded. “Indeed I did. A private investigator. It seems that Mr. Whitaker was having second thoughts and suspicions of his own about Mrs. Hilton. Like you, he thought she might have committed the dastardly deed.”

“I never thought she did it,” Susannah denied. “I had a feeling—”

“The same feeling you’re getting now about going to the Whitaker house?” Kane asked.

She nodded. She sensed Elsbeth’s presence so very strongly. And with it came an urgency that it was now or never if they wanted to return home again.

“I’ve learned to trust your feelings,” Kane told her.

This was news to Susannah. “You have?”

He nodded. Turning to Oliver, he said, “We’re going to need your help. Do you think you can help get us into the Whitaker house tonight?”

“I believe Mr. Whitaker is still at the police station giving his statement.”

“We don’t need to speak to Mr. Whitaker.”

“Then why are you going to his house?”

“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you in the carriage on the way there.”

Once they were safely ensconced inside, Oliver said, “Does this have something to do with your being from...France?”

“We’re not from France. We’re from the future. Elsbeth Whitaker’s ghost brought us back in time to solve the mystery of her death,” Kane said bluntly.

Oliver took the news well.

“I must say, you’re acting very calm about all this,” Kane noted.

“I had my suspicions that more than an ocean separated the two of you from all the rest of us,” Oliver responded dryly. “And that watch of yours, Kane. If
that
didn’t come from the future, I don’t know what would.”

“I told you not to wear that watch,” Susannah reminded him. “It was bound to get us into trouble sooner or later.”

“It got us into some serious difficulties this evening. It seems that one of your husband’s poker-playing friends had his heart set on obtaining that watch for himself. He hired a thug to accompany him in an ambush as Kane and I stood outside the boardinghouse, attempting to hail a cab and come to your rescue.”

“Were you hurt?” she immediately asked Kane.

“No. It was nothing but a nuisance.”

“If you’d arrived any later...” Susannah’s voice trailed off as a shudder shook her body.

Giving Oliver an impatient look, Kane hugged her reassuringly. “But we did arrive in time. And we’ll arrive at the Whitaker house in time, too.”

“In time to do what?” Oliver asked.

“To go back to where we belong,” Kane replied.

“This really is most amazing. So people in your time travel through the centuries as if visiting a neighboring city?”

“No, I wouldn’t say that,” Kane said wryly.

“It is still an experimental procedure, then? You are scientists, perhaps?”

“No, we’re definitely not scientists,” Susannah answered. “My real name is Susannah Hall and I’m related to a friend of Elsbeth’s—”